FIH Olympic Qualifiers: We are ready to deal with any team, said captain Savita Punia

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The Indian women’s hockey team is fully prepared for the FIH Olympic Qualifiers. The great hockey match will start from January 13 at Jaipal Singh Astroturf Hockey Stadium in Marang Gomke, Ranchi. Indian women’s hockey team coach in press conference on Thursday Jenneke Schopman and captain Savita Poonia Told about his preparations. India is in Group B in this tournament. Along with India, New Zealand, USA and Italy are also in this group. India has to play its first match against USA on 13 January. Group A consists of Germany, Japan, Chile and Czech Republic. Both the semi-final matches will be played on January 18, while the final match will be played on January 19. The top three teams out of total 8 will qualify for next year’s Paris Olympics.

Vandana Kataria will be missed

Talking to the media, Indian captain Savita Punia said that it always feels good to come here. We are all very excited. Our first match is with USA. We are ready for that. Practice matches are meant to see what is the scope for improvement. We have worked very hard for the Paris Olympics. We have learned a lot in a very short time. In such a situation, we will try our best to qualify. This tournament is going to be difficult. Because every team would like to do better. We will also give our best. Vandana Kataria is experienced and plays better. We will feel his absence, but the player who came in his place also plays better.

Our focus is on each match: Captain

The captain further said that we will completely focus on the match. Our strength is attacking and we will work on this only. You will get to see this in the match with USA. The captain says that all the teams have come here to win. Their speed is better, we will try to compete with them. Will show our better game also. She further says that qualifying for the Olympics is not going to be easy. We played the Asian Trophy here. We got a lot of support. We will just try to play better. We are ready to deal with any team.

A separate coach with the team to deal with the pressure

Team coach Janneke Schopman said that the way we won in the last championship, there was full support from the audience. This support is better for us. But somewhere it also puts pressure on us to play better. We know the strength of USA and New Zealand. But our focus will be on our strengths. We will work on that. Practice is going well. Our entire focus right now is on the first match against USA. He said that USA is a better team. Ranking does not matter here. We know she plays better. We will try to give our best accordingly. We also have coaches to help the team come out of mental stress. He is talking to the players. We’re just trying to improve our game.

Indian team is as follows

Goalkeeper: Savita Punia (Captain), Bichu Devi Kharibam.

Defender: Nikki Pradhan (Vice-Captain), Udita, Ishika Chaudhary, Monica.

Midfielder: Nisha, Vaishnavi Vittal Phalke, Neha, Navneet Kaur, Salima Tete, Sonika, Jyoti, Beauty Dungdung, Baljeet Kaur.

Forward : Lalremsiami, Sangeeta Kumari, Deepika.

india schedule

January 13: India vs USA – 7:30 pm

January 14: India vs New Zealand – 7:30 pm

January 16: India vs Italy – 7:30 pm

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